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The original was posted on /r/bestofredditorupdates by /u/Choice_Evidence1983 on 2025-06-12 04:00:06+00:00.

I am NOT OOP, OOP is u/RopePsychological567

Originally posted to r/namenerds

Previous BoRUs: #1

[New Update]: Wife wants to name our twins Romeo and Juliet

NEW UPDATE MARKED WITH ----

Thanks to u/Responsible_Lake_804 & u/soayherder for suggesting this BoRU

Trigger Warnings: pregnancy related stress

Moos Spoilers: happy

RECAP

Original Post: March 8, 2025

My wife is a huge Shakespeare fan, and she loves the idea of naming the twins Romeo and Juliet. I’m against it, I can’t get over the idea of naming our kids after a fictional couple who die. I do really like the name Juliet, I even suggested that if we go with Juliet, maybe we could name our son Tybalt after Juliet’s cousin. She insists that if we use Juliet, we have to use Romeo.

I’ll admit Romeo and Juliet is one of the only Shakespeare plays I’ve read, but I’ve tried to look online for some other Shakespearean sibling names we could use, like Ophelia and Laertes from Hamlet or Claudio and Isabella from Much Ado About Nothing. She hasn’t liked any of them because either their source isn’t serious enough or the names aren’t recognizable/famous as Shakespearean.

She’s really stuck on this. On their own, I think they’re lovely, but I don’t think they work for twins. Is there a way I can convince her this is a bad idea, or does anyone have other Shakespearean name suggestions that might win her over? I’m not sure if I’m overthinking the meaning behind the names and being weird about it, but I can’t talk with anyone about this because she wants the twins’ names to be a surprise.

Relevant Comments

rivertoyoursoul: Weren’t Viola and Sebastian twins in Much Ado About Nothing? I think those are both lovely names on their own and I’m not sure many people would immediately think of Shakespeare the way they would with Romeo and Juliet.

And they’re actually siblings not love interests.

Edit - it was Twelfth Night, sorry! Not Much Ado about Nothing!

OOP: I didn’t know about this play, I’ll check it out, but I love those two names and the fact that they are twins might sway my wife. Thank you.

kyotheawesomeelf: Are there any similar names she’d be open to, like Rowan or Roland instead of Romeo? Naming your kids after famous lovers definitely seems creepy to me.

OOP: She doesn’t like any changes/modern versions, they have to be from a Shakespeare work. That’s why I’ve been trying to find names from established siblings.

SunnySeaMonster: The specifics of Romeo and Juliet aside, neither you nor your wife should get to be “stuck on” these or any other names. If you’ve vetoed them, they’re out. It is also true that naming siblings after a couple nearly synonymous with young love is ill-advised, but even if it were not, neither parent should get to bully or steamroller the other into a naming choice.

Frame this differently with her; you are allowed to veto names just as she is allowed to veto your choices. Do not get mired in the literary merits or demerits of various Shakespearean oeuvres or characters, because it is beside the point.

This is the first of many parenting disagreements you will have in the future, in which you will need to compromise to find a solution. Now is the time to practice that skill and learn how to listen to one another’s hard limits.

OOP: We did that before she got hung up on these two names; at first, we considered names from the books we both liked, but Romeo and Juliet was the first Shakespeare play she saw, and once she got this idea, she didn’t want to hear any more.

I’m hoping I can talk her out of it but if I can’t I might show her this thread. Thank you.

Update: March 12, 2025 (four days later)

Thanks for all the comments and name suggestions. I didn’t want to speak badly about my wife, but yes, I’m well aware of how deranged it is to name a pair of siblings after a fictional couple, and I was too much of a coward to bring up the incest thing in my original post.

In defence of my wife, her pregnancy has been very hard on her. It’s her first, and naming the kids is the only thing she’s seemed happy about these days. For context, she’s seen the Romeo and Juliet play in person and is an avid reader of plays in general, but she’s always liked Shakespeare most because they were the ones she studied. A few years ago, she even ran a Shakespeare club for kids at the local library. More recently, she was rereading the play and suggested we name the kids after the main characters. I was taken aback and told her we’d sleep on it, but the following day, it was all she’d talk about, and she was so happy I didn’t have the heart to talk her out of it.

She became more and more fixated on it as the weeks went on. After making this post, I asked her again why it had to be these two names. She told me she always liked symbolic meanings and grand declarations of love, and she wanted that sort of bond to carry over to the kids in a family sense. She also mentioned that out of all the plays she’d read, Romeo and Juliet was the most iconic, that people would be able to recognise them and that it would make it easier to talk to other parents if they asked why the kids were named Romeo and Juliet.

I sat on this for a few days. And honestly, it felt like I didn’t know her. I pray this is her pregnancy brain talking, but this isn’t her. She’s always been a romantic and fixates on trends/ideas but this is just weird. Yesterday, I finally told her point-blank that we were not naming our kids after such a famous couple under any circumstances, and I showed her this thread.

She refused to look at it and broke down. My wife asked me why I couldn’t just let her have this. Some suggested she needed to hear how crazy she was from someone who wasn’t me, so I told her best friend what was happening, and she was more horrified than I was — how I probably should have reacted.

Her best friend came over after work, and I’m not exactly sure what happened, but I know they watched the 1968 movie version of Romeo and Juliet together, which I’ve been told has a sex scene. I think that snapped some sense into my wife. Her friend left a few hours ago, and my wife’s been quiet, but she asked if we could look over the names I’d picked out again.

Thanks again for all the comments; I think we both needed reality slapped into us, her from her delusion and me from my apparent lack of common sense. She’s still dead set on something Shakespear/theatre-related and somewhat matching, but now that her head is clearer, I hope we can pick something better. From the quick read of the comments I showed her, she did like the name Sebastian, but she’s on the fence about Viola. I’ll let her off the hook for now since she’s so sick, but once we’re back to normal life, I’m not letting her forget this happened. I’ll update this again once we finally have names picked out.

Relevant Comments

EliG028: The way you’re talking about your part it in this paired with you saying you’re not gonna let her forget this is raising some questions for me. You realize that you fumbled the bag here too right? Like not just because you didn’t say anything initially, but you let her get excited about the names for weeks. You let her think you were okay with the names and build hope and you build up your frustrations until you finally spoke up but sounds like you were harsh about it for what? She didn’t see the problems the names would cause and when it was brought to her attention by her friend she did the right thing and changed her mind. She did the right thing and you still sound like you have anger towards her when it’s nobodies fault but yours that you didn’t voice your concerns for weeks and instead pushed her friend to do it for you.

OOP: I’m not sure I worded it well. But she’s been very sick during this whole thing, not able to eat regularly, not sleeping, horrible cramps, etc. Naming the kids was the only thing she seemed really excited about, because the actual pregnancy hasn’t been good for her. We agreed that she would get the ultimate say in the names because she’s carrying the kids. I didn’t want to burst her bubble when she first got this idea, but as the weeks went on, I realised how serious it was. I’m not mad at her for the choice, I’m mad more at myself for not doing anything about it, and at both of us for not realising what it could do to our kid’s future. But I shouldn’t have waited so long to speak with her. The last comment was that if we ever have kids again, I hope she won’t want to name them after a couple again; not meant maliciously, but I see I didn’t say that well either.

thebadsleepwell: Is it possible your wife might be struggling with some sort of hormone-related mood issues? Some women experience prenatal issues such as prenatal depression, prenatal anxiety, and/or prenatal psychosis. I’m not saying it sounds like she has any of those conditions right now but it’s just good to have an awareness of such in…

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